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She said: “I think it's good news first and foremost for the people of your country, who can see today that... if all the levels of government of the country move together towards a common goal, it can be achieved."

Ms Mogherini also noted how amid the current crises affecting Europe, Bosnia’s application to join the EU "reminds us all of how lucky we are being able to live on a continent that has the ability of giving peace".

Ahead of Britain’s in/out referendum on EU membership, expected to be held in June, Brexit campaigners urged voters to consider the implications of further EU enlargement when deciding whether they want the UK to remain in the bloc.

Ukip’s deputy leader Paul Nuttall said: “The fact that Bosnia has 57 per cent youth unemployment, the highest rate in Europe, and the average monthly salary is less than half of that in Britain, it is clear that Bosnia will not be a net contributor to the EU but will be a beneficiary.

“This means that the UK will get even less for the £55m a day we currently pay in, and is even more reason why we would be much better off leaving the EU as soon as we get the chance.”

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Bosnia’s economy lags behind many of its Balkan neighbours

The EU's craziest decisions

Thu, February 18, 2016

THE European Union (EU) bureaucrats have come up with some bonkers directives. Here are the top eleven unusual rules proposed by Brussels that seem too barmy to be true.

The EU legislators have gone bananas over rules and directives - about bananas. European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker and co have overseen some wacky laws. Here are the craziest:

It is clear that Bosnia will not be a net contributor to the EU but will be a beneficiary

Ukip deputy leader Paul Nuttall

Leave.EU spokesman Jack Montgomery said: "With the EU in constant crisis and David Cameron's controversial push for Turkey to join already struggling, we find it amazing that Brussels would even contemplate expanding into war-torn Bosnia.

"It is highly unlikely that Croatia, the bloc's newest member, will ever allow accession, so what can this wild overreach possibly achieve besides needlessly increasing local tensions?"

Previous EU enlargements, most notably the 2004 inclusion of a further ten member states, have seen large numbers of new EU citizens move to Britain.

Albania, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Turkey are already candidate countries to join the EU at a later date.

The chairman of Bosnia’s three-president system Dragan Covic submitted his country’s application to Brussels yesterday morning.

But he admitted there was still some way to go before Bosnia becomes a candidate member state, the next stage before EU membership.

Mr Covic said: "We see that our neighbour Croatia is already a member state, Montenegro is on its EU integration path, as well as Serbia.

“Bosnia-Herzegovina is also a part of this continent.

"We are aware that this is our task, that we need to do it."

The EU’s commissioner in charge of the bloc’s enlargement, Johannes Hahn, said Bosnia was at “the beginning” of a long journey.

He added: "Membership is not possible in couple of months, or even a few years."

Despite the power-sharing presidency between Bosniaks, Croats and Serbs, unresolved wartime quarrels have so far hindered the necessary reforms the country needs to make for EU membership.